Concept: MomentumGeneral Description: This will be a Pokemon that can be utilized to gain or regain momentum for a player's team at any point in the match as its primary function.Justification: Gen. 5 is a very powerful metagame. As such, most battles are won by the smarter strategist who can best maneuver around his/her opponent's onslaught to gain even a single turn's advantage, potentially clinching them the match. This process of gaining and regaining momentum is most often the defining element that makes a winner and a loser out of a single Pokemon battle. Any top player in this metagame should agree that momentum is the most crucial element in any given match; however, "momentum" itself is a rather vaguely defined term that is never really explored in concrete terms. Is it keeping opposing teams on the defensive? Forcing switches? Good prediction? Spamming U-turn? These have all been approaches to achieving momentum, but they are also player-side and largely synonymous with "strategy," as opposed to Pokemon-side and regarding a Pokemon's role on the team. Certainly there are threats like Ferrothorn/Gliscor (defensive) and Scizor/Latios/Voltlos, etc., etc. (offensive) that can achieve momentum as we know it, but there is no current niche for a "momentum Pokemon" because the concept has been purely delegated to players and not to Pokemon. Questions to be Answered:
-How do we define momentum in terms of competitive Pokemon? What factors make current Pokemon able to achieve momentum and how can we incorporate that information into a successful CAP?
-How do different styles of play (Weather-based offense, stall, bulky offense, etc.) use momentum to achieve their goals and how can our CAP play to those strategies in an effort to take their momentum away?
-What type of traditional role (sweeper, tank, wall, support) would a Pokemon like this most resemble? Would it have to be able to fit more than one of these roles to fit in a variety of teams?
-How will the different playstyles be affected by the addition of a Pokemon that can regain offensive/defensive momentum at any given point? Will offensive teams play more conservatively? Will defensive teams play more recklessly? Will everything simply adapt to a new threat and move on normally?

Click to expand...

Typing: Flying/Fighting

Here are the options in this poll, in the order that they finished in the first round of polling:

Okay so I tried to give this CAP as much versatility as possible. A passable Speed stat to outrun certain threats in the metagame, and a decent defense for well...being able to switch into things. Alright this is a lame explanation. Let's go in depth.

HP:...okay can I just c/p what Deck posted in here? No? Anyways, I wanted a high HP stat for efficient bulk (which in turn saves EVs for it to do other things which I will get to later!), as well as to encourage different spreads than the usual 252 HP / 252 Speed. 105 HP also lets it create 101 HP substitutes, which I guess helps with Blissey but you're going to need Taunt or something I don't know. It's mostly irrelevant...

Attack: We aren't going physical on this thing so meh. If Close Combat is allowed I guess some Atk EVs lets it bypass Chansey or something. Not worth worrying about.

Defense: Instead of me trying to explain what it does, look at the calcs:

Special Attack: It is important that this CAP has plenty of firepower to maintain pressure (but not too much due to how dangerous Flying/Fighting STABs are). And I just feel that 115 is the "right" number for this CAP, especially with its 85 base Speed. Here are some calcs:

Special Defense: I'd imagine most of CAP1's defensive usefulness is taking physical blows by virtue of its typing so I didn't give it as much Special Defense. However, 105/80 is enough for it to absorb things like Virizion HP Ice and Gengar's Shadow Ball, and if you wish to go specially defensive CAP1 isn't a bad check to them.

Speed: Choosing between fast and slow wasn't easy at first, until I found out how much people didn't want a fast one. I eventually chose to go with medium Speed as being too fast discourages creative EVing to utilize its other stats (especially given the amount of threats that linger in the base 97-111 Speed category). Anyways, 85 Speed gives it the ability to outrun Heatran, Mamoswine, Smeargle, and Cloyster (which the base 70 Spreads tie with), and all are weak to Fighting but could otherwise severely threaten CAP11 with their powerful attacks (bar Smeargle who could otherwise Spore it away). Oh yeah it outruns Gyarados as a bonus. Granted, 85 Speedties with Suicune, Nidoking, and Heracross, but this CAP isn't meant to beat Nidoking anyways and Suicune usually runs no Speed (you should not try to take on offensive ones regardless), while Fighting/Flying itself kind of walls Heracross to begin with. Furthermore, 85 Speed makes it like viable as a Scarfer, allowing it to approach momentum in a different way. At the very VERY least, I would like to see this CAP outrun the base 70 group, because Cloyster can be that aggravating.

The most important part of this spread is the low speed. 70 Speed ties a number of Pokemon that often run no speed investment (eg Skarmory, Metagross, Hitmontop, and Bisharp). This means that CAP 1 can viably run a spread with very little or no speed investment and still outspeed a number of (varyingly) relevant pokemon.

The spread also ties a number of Pokemon that do often run Speed, such as Cloyster or Breloom, and of course will speed-tie opposing CAP 1, which can hit for super-effective damage. These speed-ties reduce the threat of Spore or super-effective attacks, while CAP 1 can all of these threats back for SE damage. This makes the spread viable for running max speed as well (which any spread will have to really, if they don't want to be threatened by opposing faster CAP 1's. Also, I don't think that there are too many significant Pokemon to outspeed between 70 and 85 Base Speed (Heatran, Gyarados, and Dragonite I guess, but none of these are optimal switch-ins for CAP 1 anyways), at which point Base SpA is severely hindered.

This brings me to the advantages of a low speed in general. A low speed means that there is less reason to invest in speed, making it easier to invest in CAP 1's bulk and raw power, which are more important for gaining momentum in my opinion than speed, since usually a momentumon tries to take advantage of a switch-out, when speed doesn't matter. Also, since speed-tie Pokemon like Breloom, CAP 1, and Cloyster are threatened for SE damage, they are not very capable of switching into CAP 1 and are threatened when CAP 1 is behind a substitute, furthering the case for running less speed and more bulk/offense. Finally, the low speed discourages the use of Life Orb or Choice items, since CAP 1 will be taking a lot of hits. This is very important, as we definitely don't want CAP 1 to turn into a sweeper.

This brings us to the next part of the spread, the very high SpA stat of 135. I think that this powerful attacking stat is very important for maintaining momentum. I would first bring up the common examples of Breloom and Heatran, who maintain momentum by threatening Pokemon with there high attacking stats. Also, because CAP 1 is specially based, it must rely on weaker base power attacks such as Aura Sphere (because Focus Blast is definitely not a good momentum attack due to the momentum lost when it misses) and Air Slash. This high attacking stat can threaten Pokemon that CAP 1 switches in on, and will make the opponent pay a price for switching in any new Pokemon. A high Special Attack also makes good use of Hidden Power, allowing Pokemon like Gliscor or Gyarados to be OHKOed with little to no investment (depending on the Pokemon) with the appropriate Hidden Power type.

Some would think that a high SpA stat like 135 can be broken, however, I think that this is certainly not the case. Many new Pokemon this generation have very high attacking stats (Chandelure, Haxorus, etc), but due to limited speed are not great sweepers. On top of this, CAP 1 is limited by low Base Power (or low accuracy if we go that route) moves. This precedent tells me that 135 SpA is definitely not too high.

This is also the lowest (round) stat that's Aura Sphere will always OHKO 4/0 Excadrill after SR damage (does 98.3% - 116.6%) with no SpA investment.

Next on the spread is the low HP. Low HP allows CAP 1 to better deal with Pokemon such as Ferrothorn and Gengar who utilize HP draining attacks (Leech Seed and Pain Split). It also makes investing in HP much more valuable to maximize defences, thus also leaving room to invest in SpA, Speed, or a single defence. An argument in favour of a higher HP stat is that a stat of at least 100 would allow 101 Subs to be made, which is great for preventing Chansey from completely countering this specially-based CAP, especially alongside Toxic. However, I think that making Chansey switch in is one of the best things that this pokemon could do for a team, as Chansey's terrible offenses (Seismic Toss) allow it to be set up on very easily, especially on Pokemon that are immune to Thunder Wave and Toxic like Excadrill or Gliscor.

Finally are the physical and special bulk. Physical Tankiness sits right by the limit set in the BSR thread, so most of the reasoning for it can be found there, but specific calcs can be found below. The special tankiness is designed to survive a Mixed-Blaziken's Fire Blast or a LO Virizion's +1 HP Ice (though Air Slash won't be OHKOing anyways). Important precise calculations for all of these stats can be found below.

Unfortunately the high powered rock-type attacks of Pokemon like Terrakion, Excadrill, and Landorus still are quite painful, especially with these pokemon's large bulk. However, no spread within the BSR cap will be able to take these attacks much better than this one.

Thanks to Rising_Dusk for giving me some constructive comments to fine-tune the spread!

This spread for CAP1 tries to give optimised defenses for likely spreads. It has plenty of power, allowing it to secure crucial KOs without resorting to Life Orb and threaten serious damage if left unchecked, but - while fast enough to outpace the walls it needs to - doesn't really have the raw Speed to carry out a full sweep. While the stat spread does have odd base values, it is streamlined - like most such pokemon in-game (eg Monferno, Bronzong), there is a pattern in the unorthodoxy which hopefully satisfies flavour-wise.

Offensively:

Offensive Stats: 63 / 129 / 73

The Attack stat fits comfortably within the Physical Sweepiness limits while still being high enough to do some kind of meaningful damage with the awesome Circle Throw (as well as U-Turn), should CAP1 recieve it. 129 Special Attack is high enough to get important KOs with Leftovers (assuming 252 Modest) - Aura Sphere 2HKOs Nattorei, while Conkeldurr and Virizion fall to Air Slash - and lets CAP1 be threatening. The problem with low Special Attack stats is that CAP1 will become setup fodder for bulky mons. If it doesn't hit hard enough, the opponent can almost ignore it and just bring in anything mildly specially defensive (Skarmory, Hippowdon etc.) to do whatever, and important kills like the ones mentioned above are missed.

The 73 Speed stat outspeeds most walls and gives the option to outspeed the rest while preventing CAP1 from being able to sweep teams itself.